


Dying Season

by radiobread



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Death Note (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, Dubious Morality, Fluff and Crack, M/M, basically the worlds greatest detectives are gay and working together, happy ending for crying out loud, i can't fucking believe I thought this was a good idea I'm laughing so hard, kind of ooc but uh what did you expect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-03-08 20:56:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13466388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/radiobread/pseuds/radiobread
Summary: L reminds Batman that the absence of winning isn't always losing.Ryuzaki reminds Bruce that there is more to life than the game.(OR, L and batman are gay and working together)





	Dying Season

**Author's Note:**

> Ok so I PROMISE this is serious but like this is so fucking funny you guys, none of my friends wanted to hang out and i got this idea and i actually did it instead of doing my hwork but i am having...such a hard time taking it seriously. i hope you LIKE IT, batman and L are gay i'm sorry i don't make the rules.

 

Winter puts most of her energy into killing things. Both the season, and Gotham’s own deputy mayor. 

And Gotham is a city that, like any other, loves debate. Absolutely devours the headlines and the first-page stories that pop up over the radio during their early morning commutes. The citizens want it.  _ Need  _ it. News isn’t like coffee or sex or a denver omelette. News is in the human bloodstream because  _ drama  _ is in the human bloodstream. And isn’t that, when you water it down, the first fucking instinct that man has? The instinct to avoid the terrible, but by god, completely revel in it from a far?

Bruce reads the first headline over two shots of watered down espresso and an untouched slab of toasted sourdough;  _ WINTER VS. WINTER! Gotham’s evil stepmother to have killed more than the season of ice and death? _

They get more clever as they go along, no doubt. A headline isn’t really a good headline if you can’t say it easily in one breath. But people will buy gossip as they breathe, easily and automatically and always. Even if this taste of talk is particularly political, you can’t blame the general public for taking an interest in a woman who may very well end up leaving them penniless and dying of a curable illness under an overpass. 

Anyhow, Bruce only buys the first paper. He doesn’t particularly need the rest, as someone with a near unlimited supply of non-suspicious knowledge of Gotham’s why and how and what. He knows about Winter Guthrie. About her previous spot in the New Jersey state senate, and the size of her pool, and her vote on the healthcare repeal, and her hand (some would say singular hand) in the campaign to cut funding for half of the homeless shelters in the city.

They call it a campaign because it sounds nicer. If Mrs. Guthrie had orchestrated a few “obliterate the poor folk” parties all over Gotham, now maybe it wouldn’t have caught on so fast. Maybe someone, somewhere along the line, would have held up a white flag, or at least a  _ red flag  _ when it started to look like maybe the unfortunate were  _ not  _ unfortunate because they were lazy, or unskilled, or entitled. Maybe basic human compassion is not an outdated fallacy, and instead an actual fucking instinct that the majority of people should really, really try getting in tune with? Maybe we’ve gone too far? Maybe the lower class is quite literally going to go extinct if someone doesn’t do something? Maybe someone, somewhere, somehow should please god help the poor?

Batman slips on his gauntlets.

That’s the thing, isn’t it? That’s the cherry on top. It’s always _ someone _ , somewhere, somehow. A guy in a mask. A detective behind a white screen. A dark knight and an invisible legion of hope. Nobody wants to be the guy. Nobody even wants to know the guy.

He puts Bruce Wayne’s phone into his bedside table drawer, and switches off his television set. Every channel is showing the same thing, anyway. Something tells him that the up close and personal show might prove to be a great deal more...theatrical.

“The roads are blocked.” Batman barks into another throwaway phone. He isn’t panicking yet. Nor will he, in all likelihood. It isn’t the worst shitshow that Gotham has ever seen, but it’s definitely up there. The problem is that the promise of safety is just real enough that people want to see the commotion. The bridge is absolutely piled. People aren’t rioting to get out of Gotham. They’re rioting to get in.

“I’m taking the back road.”

“Aren’t you concerned about sacrificing time?” Followed a patronizing  _ hmm?  _ Batman scoffs. Neither of them are worried about that, and each know it.

“No.” He says curtly. “I would be sacrificing time if I took the main road. Even with the added ten minutes travel time, I’ll get there faster than if I tried this way.”

“And your friends on the road haven’t thought about that?”

It’s too late now to take that into consideration. Batman has already turned around, has already  _ been  _ on the alternative route for just over a minute. Another thing that they’re both well aware of. 

“ _ Ryuzaki _ ,” Batman warns.

“Indeed.” He answers, pauses to yawn, and comes back on the line featuring the sound of food in his mouth. “You’ll get there when you get there, I suppose. I don’t have reason to believe that the fun would start without you.”

“If it starts at all.”

“Oh, it will.” Ryuzaki mumbles through something that almost sounds like a scone, if that makes any sense. “It most definitely will. Probably not until you get there. You can rest assured of your job security tonight, Bat-man.”

The long road is hardly any better. There is virtually no stretch of land or street that isn’t littered with traffic or raving civilians. Most of the stores are closed down. Some are even saying that the schools will be closed tomorrow. Ice and snow on the streets is one thing, but the public lynching of an elected official is another. The signs are the worst part.

Everyday people should take solace in the fact that they don’t know what blood looks like. At least not in excess. All of these picket signs and posters and tee shirts are written in the same fantastical shade of red. Dripping down in horrific fonts, the majority of them reading things like  _ BURN THE WINTER WITCH,  _ or  _ ROT IN HELL, GREASY GUTHRIE.  _ Blood red is very unlike real blood. Ask any professional. Real blood, especially when there’s enough to gawk at, is much more red than you’d like to imagine. Enough so that it almost doesn’t look real until you can’t afford not to believe it anymore. The citizens of Gotham have collectively chosen the wrong color to paint the lynching of their deputy mayor in. And on every, every corner. There is nowhere to hide from it.  _ Winter Guthrie Killed my 8 year old brother. SEE HOW SHE LIKES IT!  _ That one is written in two different shades of glitter.

Twenty two minutes later, Batman dials the only number in the throwaway phone once more. It doesn’t get a chance to ring more than once before the line comes to life, and Batman has the first word.

“I’m approaching Robinson park.” He says. “I can...I can see smoke.”

“Nothing has happened yet.” Ryuzaki responds after a moment. “Leave your car on the street like I told you. Tell me before you go in so I can rig the phone.”

“Copy.”

“And Batman,”

He pulls up beside a deserted housing development, and puts the car into park. It’s quiet for a moment because time is no essence, and nobody is lying about that. Batman would like to believe that it is. He’s always operated on time. On the greater good, and all of that American apple pie type shit. Ryuzaki isn’t American. He can only remember scraps of being one. And he says that the clock doesn’t own a home. And so far he has only been wrong about the nutritional value of a mounds bar. 

“You can’t save her.” He says. “I cannot stress enough the importance in remembering that you can’t save her.”

Batman balls up one fist, his knuckles blushing white. 

“I should try.”

“No, you shouldn't.” The voice on the other end of the line is untypically cutting and short. “That would be very stupid, remember?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re going to save people tonight.” The periodical sound of chewing cuts out for now. “Kira is going to give the public what they want, and it’s your job to pull back the curtain and show them that they don’t really want it.”

“Then he wins.” Says Batman.

“He’s already won this round.” Says Ryuzaki.

“Then I shouldn’t have to ask you why we’re still fighting it.” This conversation should have ended by now. Regardless of whether or not the life at stake is destined to be taken anyway, there is still a message to deliver and a crowd to control. Ryuzaki doesn’t have the time to corral his big boy fears and insecurities from however many billions of miles away. 

It shouldn’t matter, is what it boils down to. An eye for an eye is no way to play the game, let alone a life for a life. Even a life for one thousand lives. Even if it’s more than that. The repeal has passed, the underfunded shelters have been torn down, and the growing homeless population has already met another alltime high. And they call for more death on top of it all. For more shit, and bone, and blood, the  _ right  _ color of blood. And Batman swears to god, that when these people see how red blood can be when it won’t come out of the creases in your hands, that will be the message.

But what if it isn’t? Where do we draw the line when we as people can’t even agree on the right way to pronounce the word pecan? How can we be prepared to decide someone’s fate before we go home to turn in and eat our dinners and watch wheel of fortune? 

“Batman, have we lost you?”

Batman comes back down to earth, a little at a time.

“No.” He says. “I’m sorry, could you repeat the…”

“If we don’t fight then nobody will.” Ryuzaki says. “That’s it. That’s all there is to it. As far as I’m concerned, it is you and I for the time being, and we are going to do as we planned, and we are not going to lose a game that we haven’t even played in yet, do I make myself clear?”

Mild hesitation, a crack of the neck, and a grain of understanding. That’s all that he needs. Batman gets out of the car and gives the clearest yes that he is capable of giving. 

“Yes.” He repeats, louder this time. “Rig the phone. I’m heading over.”

“Copy.” Ryuzaki chirps. And his voice is void of hope, but it is also warm and low and it belongs to a man with seven different degrees in knowing what's best. “One more thing, bats.”

Batman sighs, making a note of the fact that he is going to be just a tad pissed off if this sad fucking flip phone blows up in his ear. Ryuzaki knows better, maybe. Hopefully. Probably.

“Red or white?” God, he can hear that fucker smiling. Curling his lip, nibbling at the tip of his thumb. He hesitates for a second, but only for a second because there comes a time when you stop being surprised by this kind of thing.

“White.” He decides.

“I thought as much.” Ryuzaki declares humbly. “Hang up the phone, Batman.”

“Roger that.” 

It isn’t ten seconds later that Batman has already stolen halfway down the street. A great thundering boom sounds, and behind him there are fireworks that he only turned around to look at the first time it happened. But it will happen again. That much he knows is true. It’s not like he’s taking it for granted or anything. One can only watch the flames so many times. It isn’t the explosion that he likes to watch, anyway.

Batman leaves the area and the show begins with his arrival, just as planned.

  
  
  


Burning pain is the worst to some. You never really forget about it, as long as you’re inflicted with it. And it itches like hell, for whatever reason. Maybe Bruce knew why that was at some point in time, but his years of feigning interest in science and anatomy books have long been buried. Now he’s just wishing he could remember how to get it to stop. Sawing off the entirety of his right arm with a rusty jigsaw seems less and less like a bad dream.

He should be grateful. And he is, for the most part. Batman had left with a nasty burn and some bruises that were going to leave his leg and right ass cheek looking like the black sea come tomorrow morning. But even then, he was hurt the worst. Nobody in the crowd was hurt, and Winter Guthrie came down off of the cross with minor rope burn on her wrists, but not much more than trauma. She was rumored to be pregnant, anyway. Kira wouldn’t kill a pregnant woman.

In fact, the news is saying that Batman didn’t do much more than rear the crowd and give some bleeding heart hippie speech to the mob. Kira wouldn’t have killed someone as minuscule as a corrupt American politician, especially with the sudden (and very convenient) rumors of her pregnancy. Even if the public was calling on him to do so. It wasn’t like him. And so she made it relatively unscathed into the ambulance as the citizens of Gotham either wept, or wandered home quietly, or fled from the police. Bruce wondered whether this was the end of it.

But not for long. He knew better. They both did.

Bruce Wayne doesn’t like white wine. It’s far too gentle on the senses, or at least the kind that he’s used to being peddled at wineries and debutante events. He sniffs his glass once, but doesn’t get too far before wincing. Trying alone is effort, at least. He calls is a night and goes to set the glass down. It lifts miraculously from his hand before he has the time to say  _ bingo  _ or  _ whoops  _ or whatever other word that you can say quickly.

The hand that steals it replaces it with a glass of the same style, filled with what is debatabley grape soda. A second sniff reveals that yeah, this is definitely grape soda. And not the expensive kind. 

“It’s nice to pretend sometimes.” That shoeless creature of a man walks off to the kitchen with the unpracticed swagger of somebody’s rich mother, complete with the tired hand on his lower back. “Isn’t it, Bruce?”

Ryuzaki dumps the wine glass down the sink, and then the whole bottle. Each drop that swivels down the drain, the price of a small island probably. He watches it go as if it’s some sort of game, sticking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth as the bottle glugs empty.

“Are you pretending, or am I?” Bruce snorts. “I like wine. I don’t pretend to. I’m not into white.”

“Says the man who vouched for it.”

“I was tired of red for the night.” Bruce kicks his feet up, and his eyes come to a close. He sees more when he closes them than he did when they were open. “You should be, too. I didn't even know you were in Gotham. I would have brought you a bottle of maple syrup to sip on.”

That little  _ tsk tsk tsk  _ noise. He’s going to say something witty. He’s going to try and make Bruce think in a few moments here. Ryuzaki finishes clucking his tongue disapprovingly, and leaves the kitchen for good. In a moment he’s by the sofa, toting a little round container of what looks like skin care product. Then comes the sickening smell of aloe when he twists it open. Jesus Christ.

“I don’t like wine.” He shrugs, smearing a glob of aloe Vera cream onto Bruce’s right shoulder blade without so much of a fair warning. “And I’ve never lead anyone on to believe that I do. I thought you’d like it.”

“I like the gesture.” Bruce hisses out in pain, uttering a small string of profanities. 

“I knew you would.” Ryuzaki brushes his hair back as he works, dirtying a strand or two with the medical cream. “But you wouldn’t have drank it. Not tomorrow, either. Flashbulb memory can be a nasty thing. And smell can trigger it, I’m sure you know. Even something as sacred as the smell of white wine can be ruined. I doubt if you’ll be accustomed to the smell of aloe cream after this night. Or me.”

Bruce raises an eyebrow.

“You won’t be accustomed to the smell of aloe cream, or I won’t be accustomed to the smell of you?”

Ryuzaki shrugs, but doesn’t think on it for long.

“Both.” He screws the lid back onto the jar, and slides it off to god knows why. He kisses the top of Bruce’s head, right at the spot where there will be another purple welt tomorrow. “In all probability, both.

“I don’t know about that.” Bruce says, as a sudden news bulletin flashes across the screen. Winter Guthrie is dead. She did not survive the ambulance ride, to whatever extent. The circumstances to her death are unknown, but she had seemed to be in good health, yada-yada, possible suicide, yada-whatever.

From over the couch, Ryuzaki is only half watching. He lets his head fall down to the rest where Bruce’s good arm lies. He’s biting his thumb still like nothing in the world has changed. Things really do have a way of following a pattern. And sometimes they do not. What little luck that human beings have, Bruce is sure, lies in the fact that people like L and Batman can somewhat predict the outcomes and follow the patterns.

No word on whether or not she was pregnant.

“He did it.” Bruce whispers.

“Of course he did. He was always going to.”

“Some worlds greatest detectives we got here.” 

“Exactly so.” L sips on Batman’s grape soda wine glass before handing it back to him. “Humans weren’t put on this earth to separate the good from the guilty. Neither are detectives. We’re looking for the truth, not the murder weapon.”

Bruce lays his back his head. The next channel is saying that the streets are rejoicing. Families are crying and huddling together and praying to Kira in groups because the next time someone thinks about ripping basic human rights away from people, they are going to remember the footage of Winter Guthrie’s body bag. The speculation of whether or not she came out in more than one.

“Do you believe in god?” Bruce asks. Next to him in the dark there is movement, and then a head on his lap. He does not open his eyes. Does not need to.

“I don’t know.” Says Ryuzaki. “But I know that i’m not him.”

Bruce looks out into Gotham, and kills the television set. And he breathes. And he breathes and he falls into something close to the general definition of relaxation, but never quite that.  And he looks down at the silhouette of sleep and mystery and unruly black hair, and he tried to remember that.

  
  



End file.
